Eye Collector, The (21 page)

‘What’s the matter with him?’ I asked when my mobile’s display showed four bars again.

‘He’s coughing. I’m afraid it’s getting worse.’

My stomach twisted itself into a knot.

‘Is he running a temperature?’

‘Yes, I think so.’

Meaning what? Since when does a thermometer register vague hunches instead of degrees Celsius?

I suppressed an acid remark. After all, I should have been there for our son’s birthday, not spending my time with a blind girl, a dead body and a crazy barman.

‘The last time I took his temperature it was 38.9 degrees,’ she said.

I felt relieved. ‘That’s only borderline,’ I said. A bit higher than it should be, but far from a high fever.

Nicci surprised me by asking a sensible question. ‘Should I call the doctor?’

I heard Alina say something in the room next door. The barkeep gave another laugh.

‘Yes, do that,’ I told her. I thought she was being overanxious, to be honest. Still, better safe than sorry. ‘But please don’t go private. They always send some quack
who tries acupuncture first.’

I was relaxing a little. Julian didn’t sound too bad and his mother hadn’t – for once – called in a faith healer.

‘What have you got against acupuncture?’ Nicci demanded.

‘Nothing.’ I snapped. ‘It just isn’t my first choice when it comes to treating the sick.’

Nicci seemed deaf to the anger in my voice. The corpse we’d just discovered in the adjoining room surfaced in my mind once more.

‘Oh, Zorro,’ she said, using a pet name I hadn’t heard her use for ages, ‘what’s your problem?’ She sighed. ‘Why do you always sound so bitter when we
talk together?’

What’s my problem?
Furiously, I switched the phone from one ear to the other.
You want to know what my problem is? Okay, I’ll tell you.

‘I’m feeling rather annoyed, darling. That’s because I’m hunting a sicko who seems to be trying to pin his serial murders on me, and the only person who can exonerate me
is a blind girl who claims she can see into the past.
That’s
my problem.’

Quite apart from the rotting corpse in the poolroom next door.

I looked in that direction. The barman hadn’t moved, so he couldn’t have got at Alina in the meantime.

‘A blind girl?’

I shut my eyes. How could I have been stupid enough to broach such a subject? I might as well have handed Nicci an invitation to a séance. Now that her interest had been aroused, she
would bombard me with questions ad infinitum.

‘She’s a medium, right?’

‘Forget what I said.’

I went to the bar room entrance and put the chain on the door to prevent any potential customers from bursting in on this madhouse.

‘Listen to me, Zorro. This is very important, you hear?’

‘Darling, I really can’t talk now!’

I heard a pool cue fall to the floor, then Alina murmuring something. Meanwhile, Nicci was saying, ‘I know you don’t believe in these things – things we can’t explain
– and that’s your privilege, but—’

‘I’ve really got to...’

I glanced at the poolroom. The barkeep had disappeared from view.

‘You must stay away from her.’

‘What? Why?’

I couldn’t hear a word after that, neither from Alina nor from the barman. Instead, a protracted, heavy snoring sound came drifting out into the taproom.

‘I’ve told you a thousand times,’ Nicci was saying, but her voice had melted into the background like the ominous film music that accompanies the hero to his doom.

Except that I’m not an actor.

‘You attract evil like a magnet. You only wrote about it before, but now it’s all around you...’

True. It’s with me here and now...

‘... and it’ll destroy you, Alex. I don’t know this blind girl, but I can sense she’s involving you in something you’ll never be able to escape from,
understand?’

‘Yes,’ I said. For one thing because she’d unwittingly put her finger on the truth. I really did feel like someone sinking ever deeper into quicksand the more he struggled. For
another, because I had to cut this conversation short.

‘Keep away from all forms of negative energy, Alex. Don’t provoke evil or it’ll destroy you. Come home – come home for Julian’s birthday!’

So saying, Nicci hung up and left me alone with the madhouse otherwise known as my life.

With Alina, TomTom and the barkeep.

And the corpse, which gave me a wave as I went back into the poolroom.

‘Woshuwon’?’

The dead man, who had until recently been sprawled across the baize in a welter of blood with his neck broken, was now sitting on the edge of the pool table, dribbling. He was also engaged in
other activities which murder victims normally can’t manage. Breathing, for example. And speaking, albeit in a language I didn’t understand.

‘Karnaguy’avakip?’

My eyes strayed to Alina, who had pulled up a chair and was sitting not far from the pool table. TomTom, lying at her feet, yawned. Linus did likewise a few moments later.

‘I thought he was...’ I broke off and rubbed my eyes. My headache had suddenly returned with a vengeance. There was a rectangular, lace-curtained lampshade over the pool table, and
although the bulbs inside didn’t generate much more light than a few candles, they had dazzled me when I made the mistake of looking straight at them.

‘I thought he was dead,’ I said, completing my sentence with an effort. Multicoloured UFOs danced before my eyes as I looked at the barkeep.

‘Dead? Nonsense, Linus always sleeps with his eyes open. It isn’t his only trick, as I’m sure you’ve noticed.’

I nodded, brushing the baize with my hand as I made my way round the table. It was dawning on me that I’d completely misinterpreted the scene in my agitation. The ‘bloodstain’
was an old one – either the result of an overturned beer glass or possibly bodily fluid of some kind. It definitely wasn’t the squalid street musician’s lifeblood, because he was
unscathed, and his bloodstained spittle stemmed from a serious but far from fatal gum infection. As for the unremitting stench of a corpse, that appeared to be his natural body odour. A blend of
excrement, urine, sweat and grime, it was testimony to life on the Berlin streets.

‘Phosiapatikil’,’ Linus proclaimed with a portentous air when I was standing directly in front of him.

Looking into his emaciated face and trying to establish eye contact with him, I was reminded of why so many people are mistakenly pronounced dead. Only two months earlier I’d written a
piece about a woman who had leapt off the autopsy table in a leading Berlin hospital. Linus’s eyes were as lifeless as Alina’s.

‘What happened to him?’ I asked.

‘I already told your girlfriend,’ the barkeep replied, but he clearly relished an audience and seemed only too willing to repeat himself. ‘Linus used to be a star performer. He
played with various bands in big venues – even at the old Wembley Stadium in England, so he says.’

Linus gave the sort of approving nod a person gives when talking about the good old days, when all was still well with the world.

‘They say his manager took him for a ride – paid him in drugs instead of cash. The poor devil wound up not only broke but completely bananas. He swallowed one pill too many or shot
up once too often and just collapsed after a gig. He’s been talking a lingo of his own ever since.’

‘Woshuwon’, eh?’ said Linus, seemingly in confirmation.

‘Anyway, he did a spell in a loony bin somewhere in the Grunewald, but he came out goofier than he went in, believe me.’

I went up to Linus, who was still perched on the edge of the pool table but swaying precariously.

‘Can you hear me?’ I asked.

He shrugged.

Okay, here goes. The most he can do is spit in my face.

I risked it and showed him the photo on my mobile. It was the shot of his encounter with the unknown man.

‘Do you remember this guy?’ I asked. Linus’s shoulder-shrugging became more violent. Sudden fury carved deep furrows in his brow and he started to pluck at his few remaining
strands of hair.

‘Wankabumpami!’ he said. He repeated the meaningless word several times in succession.

‘Any idea what that means?’ Alina asked the barman.

‘None.’ He laughed. ‘I don’t speak Druggy.’

‘Wankakikmigit!’ said Linus, who was far less amused.

If my eyes hadn’t deceived me, he’d just pulled out a long hair and stuffed it into his mouth.

‘He’s talking about his guitar case, isn’t he?’ I said.

‘Could be. If anyone can translate his gibberish it’s the girl who goes around with him.’ The barkeep’s’s gaze strayed to Alina, then lingered on the dog.
‘But she’s got a screw loose too, if you know what I mean. Calls herself Yasmin Schiller and was in the same loony bin, but on the staff. She often sits at the bar and goes on about
their plans to form a band together – things like that. Anyway, Yasmin told me Linus mixes up different words in the wrong order. His head’s like a cocktail shaker, she says.’

He gave another laugh.

Linus’s eyes glazed over. I wondered if he still grasped we were talking about him.

‘For instance, he often says “Eetmaishiwanka.” Must have something to do with wankers.’

‘Of whom there are plenty in his life, no doubt,’ Alina put in.

Linus turned to her. ‘Wankakikmigit!’ he said again. It sounded as if he were requesting confirmation of his statement, but only TomTom was paying much attention to him. The
retriever gazed intently at the busker with his tongue lolling out.

‘What did you show him just now?’ The barkeep had removed his glasses, which were dangling from the corner of his mouth. He was so close I could smell his bad breath. ‘Can I
see?’

I handed over the phone, remembering too late that the man in the picture bore a strong resemblance to me. However, the barkeep took a cursory glance at the miniature screen and didn’t
seem to notice.

‘The guy with Linus is a professional conman,’ I said, quickly concocting an innocuous story. ‘That picture of him bumping into Linus was caught by a CCTV camera yesterday. We
thought Linus might be able to give us some more pointers.’

‘And who would you be?’

Suddenly alert, the barkeep’s eyes darted from me to Alina and back. I produced my press pass from the hip pocket of my jeans. ‘We’re writing a story about the man.’

He guffawed loudly, then pointed to Alina. ‘Oh, sure, and the blind girl’s your photographer, right?’

Unable to think of an appropriate retort in time, I felt caught out. The barkeep seemed unworried.

‘I couldn’t care less who you are. Just as long as that bastard in the picture isn’t a pal of yours.’

‘No way.’ Alina and I spoke almost simultaneously.

I put my press pass away and took the phone back. It was moist from the barkeep’s fingers.

‘All right,’ he said. ‘I’ll tell you something about that shit in the picture.’

‘You know him?’

The Eye Collector?

‘No. But yesterday afternoon, around four, Yasmin came in here. She was hopping mad – cussing and swearing about some arsehole who’d had a spat with Linus. The guy had kicked
his guitar case.’

Wankakikmigit.

I looked at Alina, who had gone down on one knee and was patting TomTom. She nodded to convey that she was thinking the same as me.

The time and place both fit. It was the man on the tape.

‘Linus’s takings were scattered across the pavement – a whole day’s worth, I reckon. An hour later he came in and spent it all on booze.’ The barkeep nodded at
Linus. ‘With obvious results.’

‘This girl Yasmin,’ I said, ‘where can I find her?’

‘Do I look like an effing social secretary? I don’t keep my customers’ appointments diaries. Sometimes she drops in every day, sometimes not for two or three weeks.’

Terrific.

I’d just decided that we’d wasted far too much time barking up the wrong tree when there was a loud smack.

Everyone in the room gave a start. Everyone but Linus.

‘Wankaparkatikki!’ He gave the edge of the pool table another slap with the flat of his hand.

‘Yes, yes, I know,’ said the barkeep, turning to go. ‘Come on, Linus, I’ll stand you a coffee. There may even be some sausages left in the kitchen.’

He clearly considered the conversation at an end. Telling Alina to stay put, I followed him into the taproom and barred his path before he reached the counter.

‘What did Linus say just then?’

The old man stared at my hand, which was gripping his shoulder, then looked me in the eye. He didn’t speak until I’d let go of him.

‘Linus is still furious with the guy, but not because he kicked his guitar case, nor because he had to spend half an hour looking for his coins in the gutter.’

‘So why?’

‘Because he’d left his car in a disabled parking space.’

Wankaparkatikki...

I massaged my neck, applying pressure to a migraine spot immediately beside the cervical vertebrae – a trick a neurologist had shown me once.

That took some working out.

‘Linus is a good guy, really. His brains may be scrambled but his heart’s in the right place.’

‘Tikkikosta!’

I turned at the sound of Linus’s voice. He was standing in the poolroom doorway, grinning with his fist raised. Alina came into view behind him.

‘Tikkikostapulenti!’

‘Yes, you’re happy about that, aren’t you? The wanker’s in for a nice, fat parking fine.’ The barkeep formed an O with his thumb and forefinger and made an obscene
gesture.

‘A fine?’ I said, feeling more and more of a dork at having to get a mentally deranged busker’s gibberish translated by a no less peculiar barkeep. Then I suddenly grasped,
without his help, what Linus had just said.

Tikkikostapulenti!

The Eye Collector had been given a ticket.

A ticket that could identify him.

THE EYE COLLECTOR’S FIRST LETTER EMAILED VIA AN ANONYMOUS ACCOUNT

To: Thea Bergdorf

Subject: The truth...