I Am Your Judge: A Novel (59 page)

“So he, too, has a reason to take revenge on Burmeister,” Bodenstein put in. “A very personal reason.”

“Okay.” Nicola Engel nodded. “How shall we proceed?”

“The APB for both suspects has already been issued,” said Kai. “Their houses are staked out, and we’re looking for both cars. The IT specialists at State HQ are tracing where the last two e-mails from the Judge came from. And we went through the property records looking for Mieger’s weekend cabin. It must be somewhere near Kelkheim. Vivien Stern remembered that on the way there, they stopped at an ice cream parlor located right behind the S-Bahn tracks.”

Pia again read the text of the obituary for Ralf Hesse.
RALF HESSE HAD TO DIE BECAUSE HIS WIFE IMPLICATED HERSELF IN THE COERCION AND ACCEPTANCE OF THE DEATH OF A HUMAN BEING BY EXERTING PSYCHOLOGICAL PRESSURE.

What would Bettina Kaspar-Hesse feel when she read that? Wouldn’t it be better to withhold from her this cynical accusation of guilt? Yet she might hear about it anyway, just as Gehrke had.

“When were the e-mails sent?” Bodenstein inquired.

“Both within a minute of each other,” said Kai. “Between eleven fifty-two and eleven fifty-three
A.M
.”

“Burmeister left the Frankfurt Airport at around seven this morning.” Pia stood up and stepped over to the map on the wall. Colored pins marked the crime scenes. “Assuming that they kidnapped him from there, they would have about four hours to transport him somewhere and amputate his hand. So they must be somewhere in the vicinity of Frankfurt.”

“I’ll check the surveillance cameras at the airport in front of Terminal One,” Kai said, nodding.

“Take a look at this,” said Christian Kröger, who had been studying the photo. “I turned up the brightness on the image, and look what’s in the background.”

Everyone looked at the big screen.

“Those tiles. It looks like an old butcher shop or bakery,” Bodenstein suggested.

“Or a large kitchen,” Nicola Engel added. “Can you sharpen it up any?”

“I’m afraid not. The quality and the resolution of the photo aren’t very good,” said Kröger.

“So we should look for abandoned buildings with large kitchens and butcher shops within a radius of about one hundred kilometers,” Cem suggested.

Finally something was happening in the investigation. While the team brainstormed, Pia was thinking. It was terrible that Burmeister had fallen into the clutches of the sniper, but she had no reason to reproach herself. He had chosen to ignore all her warnings. Hartig had been missing for days. And Stadler had never been in Southern Bavaria, but he wasn’t in his house in Liederbach either. Where did the two men hide out?

Wolfgang Mieder’s Opel had been in the garage unit in Sossenheim when it wasn’t in use. Maybe the sniper had switched back and forth between the two cars—a very clever idea. Thomsen hadn’t rented the garage, but maybe Hartig or Stadler had; neither one of them liked Thomsen. It was easy to assume that the two had laid down a false trail that led to Mark Thomsen. For every dead end the police were lured into, the sniper gained more time.

“Is Thomsen still in custody?” Pia asked the team .

“Yes. He was transferred around noon to the provisional prison,” said Kai.

“Everybody, listen up please!” said Pia, standing up. “I’m sure that Thomsen knows the location of the weekend cabin. And we need to protect Professor Hausmann and Dr. Janning, and their relatives, from Dirk Stadler.”

“What do you propose?” Bodenstein straightened up.

“We can cancel the stakeouts at Stadler’s and Hartig’s houses,” Pia said excitedly. “Instead we should tap their phones, as well as the landline and cell of Erik Stadler, in case he’s involved in this with his father. Somebody has to call Hausmann and Janning and ask them about any relatives who might be in danger. In addition, we have to ramp up the pressure on Rudolf. Bring him to the station and show him the photo of Burmeister. Do the same with Thomsen and ask him about this weekend cabin.”

“Understood!” Bodenstein stood up. “Start with Thomsen. And I want to talk to Helen Stadler’s friend.”

“She’s scheduled to fly back to the States this evening,” said Kai.

“She’ll have to postpone her trip,” Bodenstein decided. “She has to come here, ASAP. And please print out some copies of Burmeister’s photo.”

Dr. Nicola Engel followed Bodenstein and Pia out to the corridor.

“Is there anything I can do to help?” she asked.

“Yes,” Bodenstein answered dryly. “Keep the big picture in mind. Because right now, I think I’ve lost all sense of perspective.”

*   *   *

Mark Thomsen knew about the Ranch, as Wolfgang Mieger’s cabin was called, because Helen had recounted with enthusiasm the happy days she had spent there. It was located in the popular weekend getaway area between Fischbach and Schneidhain. He couldn’t remember the exact address, but Kai found it in a matter of minutes by doing a land-register search for the city of Kelkheim. Several patrol cars were dispatched at once and an SAU action was ordered for Eibenweg, because it was presumed that Stadler or Hartig was holed up inside and armed. Cem and Kathrin phoned Hausmann and Janning and then checked to make sure that Vivien Stern hadn’t simply taken off to America before Bodenstein had spoken with her. In the meantime, Bodenstein, Pia, Kröger, and Kim drove through the leaden-gray day to Fischbach. Along the shoulders, trash bags had been piled up next to overflowing garbage cans. The waste attracted rats and foxes, which even in broad daylight boldly dashed across the eerily deserted streets. Many people had either left town for a while or barricaded themselves in their houses and apartments. Most of the cars they passed going the other way were police patrol cars. Commuter train and bus schedules had been canceled for days, newspaper and mail delivery as well as garbage removal was still suspended, and delivery drivers and construction workers refused to work. Numerous stores and restaurants were closed, and in the supermarkets, only skeleton crews were working because many employees preferred to call in sick rather than risk being shot on their way to work.

The thermometer had again dropped below freezing. The hoarfrost on the bare branches and twigs had created a true winter wonderland, but none of them even noticed. Pia drove straight through Fischbach, turned onto the B 455 toward Königstein, and then into the weekend cabin region two kilometers farther on. They passed by the Fischbach Tennis Club, their car bouncing over the unpaved road. With a loud cracking sound, the tires broke through the ice on the puddles filling the potholes.

“Turn in here!” Kröger pointed at a street sign. “Number 19.”

Several uniformed police officers were waiting along the street as requested, and Pia pulled in behind a patrol car. A little later, the SAU from Frankfurt showed up and secured the property and house.

“The house is empty,” the team leader informed Bodenstein ten minutes later. “You can go inside.”

“Thank you,” said Bodenstein with a nod.

Number 19 was a small, unobtrusive cabin situated among huge fir trees. The yard, surrounded by a tall yew hedge and a rusty chain-link fence, ended abruptly at the edge of the forest. They entered the property through a squeaky gate that hung between two stone pillars overgrown with lichen. On the weather-beaten mailbox they saw a barely legible handwritten sign with the names of the owners:
Wolfgang and Gerda Mieger
.

“In the wintertime, there’s not much happening here,” Bodenstein said. He had grown up only a couple of kilometers away. “It started with a few huts, and gradually regular houses were built with electricity but no sewer network. Most of the houses were built illegally.”

“Mieger’s dacha—a perfect hideout,” Pia remarked. “Especially this time of year.”

“Don’t touch anything,” Kröger reminded her unnecessarily.

The little cabin had wooden shutters and a porch with two steps leading up to it. Three wooden wagon wheels formed the railing, which did give the cabin the look of a ranch house. In front of the porch was a chopping block with fresh wood chips strewn around it.

Bodenstein and Pia pulled on booties and gloves and went inside the cabin, which consisted of one big room with a kitchen niche. Two doors led off to the left and right. It smelled musty and like stale smoke. Bodenstein felt like he was in a wooden coffin: pine floor, closed shutters, the walls and ceiling paneled with tongue-and-groove boards. He inspected the kitchen area. In the sink were a pot, a plate, and dirty utensils, and on a plastic drainer two clean glasses and another plate. The small refrigerator was full of groceries. The ashes in the fireplace were still lukewarm. He opened the door to the small room on the right side. The bed in there was unmade, with clothes and dirty underwear scattered about. Bodenstein turned around. On the kitchen table were newspapers, and on a pine cabinet stood an old-fashioned tube TV.

He stopped in the middle of the room, closed his eyes for a moment, and balled his hands into fists. He could physically feel the presence of Stadler. The man’s words
I am a pacifist
still rang like mocking laughter in his ears. Pia, Kim, and Christian Kröger were walking about in the cabin; the dull pine floor covered with a faded runner creaked under their feet.

“Boss!” Pia’s voice tore him out of his musing. “Have a look at this!”

He opened his eyes, followed her to the room to the left of the living room, and stopped in the doorway as if rooted to the spot.

Neatly lined up in rows on the wall were photos of the victims, pieces of street maps, and satellite photos. In the filing tray on the desk were dossiers on every single victim and their circle of friends and relatives. In a cardboard box were five empty file folders, each labeled with a name.

*   *   *

Outside the cabin, Kröger circled around and found the spot where Stadler dumped the ashes from the fireplace. He seemed to have taken the trash with him, because the eighty-liter garbage can was empty and overgrown with moss.

“He burned a pair of shoes,” Kröger announced. “But the soles survived. We’ll compare them with the shoe prints we found at the construction site in Griesheim.”

“What should we do now?” Pia asked.

Bodenstein thought hard. He couldn’t afford to allow even the tiniest mistake, or he’d be taken off the case. And the press would tear him and his team to bits.

“We’ll wait here for him. He’s got to come back eventually,” he decided. “Can the front door be closed?”

“The lock suffered a little damage,” replied the SAU leader. “But we can close the door so that nothing is noticeable at first glance.”

“Good. Christian, take pictures of everything, but don’t mess anything up.”

Those last four words under different circumstances would have made Kröger blow up, but he merely nodded and got to work. The SAU team took up positions in the neighboring yards and in the woods behind the house. Two plainclothes officers had already found an unobtrusive spot to station themselves in the parking lot of the Fischbach Tennis Club at the entrance to the weekend area. They would alert the leader of the SAU team when Stadler drove past.

Ostermann called. The e-mails from the Judge had been sent from a Wi-Fi connection in a café in Unterliederbach. He had already sent a patrol over there to quiz the staff.

“We need to interrogate Erik Stadler and his girlfriend,” Bodenstein mused out loud as he headed back to the car with Pia and Kim. “Their computers, laptops, and smartphones must be confiscated. And I also want the two Winklers brought to the station.”

“But if they turn out to be involved and they’re suddenly incommunicado, Stadler might be warned off,” Pia remarked. “He’d probably assume that we’d talk to his son and the Winklers first. If they’ve agreed to phone each other at regular intervals, he’ll think he still has plenty of time, as long as he’s able to reach them. If he can’t, he’ll kill Burmeister and Hartig and go underground.”

Bodenstein scowled.

“Besides, none of them will say a word if they’re in on it,” Pia added. “It’s better if we gather all the facts and think them over so we don’t miss anything.”

Bodenstein’s cell rang. Ostermann again. He put it on speaker.

“We’ve looked at the video from the surveillance cameras at the airport,” said Kai. “Between six thirty and seven thirty
A.M
. The plane from the Seychelles arrived at Gate C in Terminal 1. Burmeister got into a cab that pulled up next to him when he came out of the arrivals hall at six fifty-eight. Then a second man got in the backseat. The number of the cab is legible. We’re checking it now.”

“So they nabbed him right at the airport,” said Pia in disbelief. “While I was talking to Burmeister, the sniper must have been very close.”

She tried to recall the situation in the arrivals hall. There wasn’t much going on compared to the departures hall. Even as Pia was speaking with Burmeister’s ex-wife and preparing herself mentally for the conversation with the doctor, she was also carefully observing all the other people in the waiting area. Except for a few airport employees and four or five business travelers in the coffee shop, she saw only people meeting friends and relatives. So the sniper must have been in disguise.

“Is there also a surveillance camera in the hall? One that would show the gate and the coffee shop?” Pia inquired.

“It’s possible,” replied Kai. “Since the bombing in 1985, there’s hardly a corner that isn’t on closed-circuit TV.”

“The sniper must have been one of the men in the coffee shop,” Pia decided. “Could you please check that out?”

“Sure, will do. See you later.”

Pia shifted into gear and drove off.

“I know that soon we’ll be getting a message telling us where Burmeister’s body is,” she said bitterly.

“Wrong,” Kim put in from the backseat. “They won’t kill him. They’ll just mutilate him so he can never work as a surgeon again. In principle, the amputation of his right hand has already done that.”

“We couldn’t protect him or any of the other victims,” Bodenstein said somberly. “We’ve always been one step behind.”

“The whole time we’ve had two stories running simultaneously,” said Pia, ignoring her boss’s reproaches. “First, of course, we have the circumstances surrounding the death of Kirsten Stadler. That case had been swept under the rug, but is on record, and as such, not a secret that absolutely had to remain one. But the reason behind the UCF’s stubborn stonewalling is really what Helen Stadler was trying to track down. To this day, only a very small circle knows about it: Rudolf himself, Janning, Hausmann, and Burmeister. The official reason for Rudolf’s departure was purportedly his authoritarian management style and the problems that allegedly resulted. But this morning, Burmeister had sheer fear in his eyes until he realized that I was bluffing. The same for Janning. When I told him that Hausmann had told me everything, he stopped short and switched to one-syllable answers.”