Desert Fire (4 page)

Authors: David Hagberg

BOOK: Desert Fire

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“Either just before or just after her death. I can't be absolutely certain until after the autopsy. But I'm seeing what I presume to be ejaculate on her inner thighs.”

Roemer stared at Sarah's body.

“He was in a hurry,” Manning said. “He killed her and it excited him. He couldn't wait to fuck her.”

“A boyfriend?” Roemer asked. There was a buzzing in his head.

“Perhaps.” Manning was agitated. “If you could just tell me why you're here, we wouldn't be operating in the dark.
Verdammt,
we could catch the dirty bastard who did this.”

“Did she have a car?”

Manning sighed. “Apparently. She had a valid driving license, and we found a copy of the registration for a 1986 Opel. But we haven't found the car yet. There is an outside chance that she was driven home. One of the
people below thought they heard a car pull up and the victim come in alone.”

Roemer shook his head. “I've seen enough for now. If you would be so kind as to send along your reports as soon as possible â¦”

“Yes, sir,” Manning said, and he and the coroner stepped aside as Roemer left the way he had come: quietly and anonymously.

ROEMER HAD BEEN to the Chief District Prosecutor's KÃ¶nigswinter home before, but this time there was no butler. Ernst Schaller himself opened the door, took Roemer's coat, hung it on a hook and showed him to the study in the back, uncharacteristically apologizing right off.

“Sorry we had to call you out so late. But then murder never is very convenient, is it?” Schaller sat him in a wingback chair by the blazing fire, and poured him a stiff cognac. “Such a terrible thing, death, especially in one so young, so vital and alive, don't you agree?”

Roemer nodded absently. He was weary, and the young woman's smashed face wouldn't leave his mind. There were three locks on her door, all of them open. The murderer had been angry, yet there had been no other signs of a struggle in the apartment.

“Just one other thing to attend to, then we can get started,” Schaller said. “If you'll just excuse me.”

He left, and Roemer sat back, snifter in hand. The
room was large and smelled of burning wood and pipe tobacco. There was one wall full of books, floor to ceiling, which surprised Roemer. He had never thought of the Chief Prosecutor as a learned man. Perhaps they were for show.

Along two other walls was a large collection of photographs showing a younger Schaller with the American president Kennedy, with Reinhard Gehlen (the founder of the postwar German Secret Service), with Willy Brandt, Konrad Adenauer and other German and international leaders.

It was past four in the morning, and though tired, Roemer was wide awake. A young woman's murderer lurked somewhere (presumably still in the city), and the Chief District Prosecutor had something to say about it. Roemer felt as if he were watching a stage play; he desperately wanted to know the ending so that he could go home without having to endure the middle. Every case he'd ever been assigned to, he took personally. His ex-wife would say he couldn't take on the entire world's problems. But he couldn't be stopped from trying, one at a time.

The carpet seemed old and obviously expensive. It probably cost more than everything Roemer owned. But then Schaller was a political animal, while Roemer was not. Schaller had the right connections, knew the right people, traveled in the right circles, while Roemer was nothing more than a cop with a penchant for irritating people, especially ex-wives, lovers and supervisors.

The cognac was very good, very German. Probably Asbach-Uralt. Roemer sipped it, then sat back and closed his eyes.

Sharazad Razmarah was an Iranian-born American, according to her U.S. passport. What had brought her to Germany? The job? A friend? A lover? A lark? A murder investigation was like meeting a new person. There were the first impressions that gradually resolved themselves into real opinions as time went on, until in the very end
the nasty bits finally presented themselves in a sad commentary on what one person could do to another.

The house was very still at this hour of the morning. Roemer supposed Schaller's wife and the house staff were all asleep, as good people should be. Yet he could hear a murmur of distant conversation. He glanced over at the massive leather-topped desk, where one of the buttons of the executive telephone was lit. Who was Schaller speaking to, and what was he saying that could not be said here?

The murderer had been careful to pry some object out of a dead girl's hand, and yet careless enough to step in her blood and track it through the apartment and down the stairs. Carelessness, or arrogance, Roemer wondered. And where was her car?

Schaller appeared in the doorway. He was shorter than Roemer, but with the same huskiness to his frame, and similar, but older, meatiness to his face; large nose, firm lips above which perched a Prussian mustache. He was dressed in gray trousers and an open white shirt, over which he wore a gaudy brocaded smoking jacket. He reeked of pipe tobacco and cognac.

“Was it terrible, Roemer?” He leaned against his desk. “Was she terribly mangled?”

Her jaw was broken, Roemer thought. Her face was smashed. Her breasts bruised, her body scalded. And she had been raped afterward. Schaller got to the cases after they had been investigated. He never had to root about in the gruesome mess.

Schaller, eyes bright, stared at Roemer as if waiting for a bit of gossip. But he was frightened too, Roemer could see in the rigid set of his shoulders.

“It'll be just a few minutes now, and then we can get started,” Schaller said.

“A few minutes for what, Chief Prosecutor?”

“Someone else is coming along. Shed some light on the mystery. Give you some much-needed information to go on. You'll need it, believe me. Delicate.”

Roemer sat forward. “Can you tell me why she was murdered, sir?”

Schaller looked aghast. “Good God, no! What must you be thinking?”

“You called me out in the middle of the night. You said that this murder could have political ramifications. Yet the City Criminal Police Division knows nothing of this.”

“I'm just the go-between, believe me, Roemer. I was advised of the poor girl's murder and was asked if I could provide an investigatorâthe very best in all of Germany for the job.”

“Lieutenant Manning has already begun â¦”

“The Kriminalpolizei have their own case. This is another matter.” Schaller reddened.

“It is the same murder.”

The telephone rang and Schaller hopped away from the desk and picked it up before it could ring again. “Yes?”

Roemer watched the Chief Prosecutor, who turned away.

“He's here now, sir,” Schaller said.

Roemer wondered who the Chief Prosecutor called “sir” in such an obsequious manner; whoever Sharazad Razmarah was or why she had been killed, she had to be very important.

“No, sir, Major Whalpol will be here momentarily for the briefing. I just spoke with him by mobile telephone. He was on his way.”

Was this a crime involving the military, then? Was Major Whalpol some army prosecutor here to establish a liaison with the Federal Bureau of Criminal Investigation, with Schaller as the conduit? Perhaps Sharazad Razmarah had worked on military secrets. Then what was Roemer needed for?

“Yes, sir, I promise I will let you know as soon as,” Schaller said. “Yes, sir,” he said again, and he hung up. For a moment he stood still; then he turned around.

He had just received another scare. Roemer could see it written on his face.

“Do you mind telling me what's going on, sir?” Roemer asked quietly.

“In due time,” Schaller said. “Before this night is over, you'll be privy to all the grubby little secrets. This isn't fun and games, you know. There is real concern here from on high. On high, I'm telling you. Christ!”

Yes, Christ, Roemer thought. Christ in heaven. He remembered when Gretchen took him to the baroque Jesu Churchâfor months afterward he'd been concerned that he hadn't had any reverence while facing the altar with its hand-carved statue of Christ on the cross. In such a world as this, religion meant very little to him.

“You're going to have to understand from the outset that this is a very difficult, very delicate matter.”

“Who was this girl?”

“An engineer, Roemer. A very good nuclear engineer, from what I'm told. But none of this should have happened. It's just awful. The repercussions could be â¦” He seemed to search for the word. “ â¦ could be simply shattering. One minute she is alive, and in the next she is a shattered lump of lifeless flesh and bone. It makes no sense.”

“You knew her, sir?”

Schaller gaped at him. “You think that I'm some cold fish here, dealing merely in numbers. In case histories. No personalities. Well, Investigator, that couldn't be further from the truth.”

Roemer had a hard time accepting the man's sincerity. Cynicism will kill us all. His father's line. It was painful, but he couldn't accept the statement from his father any more than he could from Schaller. What was missing? Was life passing him by? Or was it that he didn't care? Or cared too much? The two Germanies were reunited. Be careful what you wish for, the adage went. You might get it. Not many in Germany were happy.

“I'm sorry,” he said.

“No need to be.” The Chief District Prosecutor pushed away from his desk. At the sideboard he poured a drink, knocked it back, then set the glass down. “I know about you, Roemer. You're a good German. You, among all people, are like us. You understand.”

A chill passed through Roemer. “Sir?”

Schaller spun around. “Don't make this more difficult than it already is. You cannot believe â¦”

Headlights flashed on the study windows and moved toward the front of the house.

“You selected me because I am discreet,” Roemer suggested.

“Your past is bound with Germany's.”

“Yes, sir.”

Schaller nodded hesitantly. “You understand nationalism? Loyalty?”

“That, sir, as well as truth.”

Schaller flinched. “Truth, tempered with wisdom. Truth, tempered with an understanding of the real world.”

“Murder is its own truth,” Roemer said. “If it is not war, then it is murder.”

“Your definition of war and mine may be different.”

“I think not. Especially not in the final analysis.”

The heavy brass knocker sounded loud and hollow. For the moment Schaller seemed like a cornered animal. Clearly he wanted something settled here, and yet his tension indicated his uncertainty.

For the first time this morning, Roemer was of no mind to help. He looked down at his large, powerful hands. In
Gymnasium
he had played soccer. He'd been told that his speed, combined with his rugged frame, made him an awesome force on the playing field. There had been talk at the time of his going professional. He had opted instead for the Police Academy at Westphalia. Among her other complaints, his ex-wife always said he was too serious. “Have more fun in life,” she told him.

Schaller hurried out of the room, his impasse unresolved,
leaving Roemer to sink back into his own thoughts, made more morose by Schaller's implication that one's national loyalty took precedence over murder. And he wondered: If it came down to hurting his father, would he do it? Presumably no one knew that the old man was finally dying, and would soon be out of reach of the zealots. Did it matter any longer?

He heard them out in the stairhall, talking in low voices. Then the front door closed with a heavy thump, and moments later Schaller appeared with his other guest, a tall, very thin man, dressed in a dark, old-fashioned southern suit.

Roemer put his brandy snifter down and got to his feet as Schaller and the other man came in.

“Walther Roemer, Ludwig Whalpol,” Schaller said breathlessly.

Roemer shook the man's limp, damp hand. “Herr Major,” he said.

Whalpol's left eyebrow rose, but he smiled. “Let me tell you, Investigator, that I've heard a lot of good things about you. Believe me, really tremendous things. It's good to have you with us.”

“He's already been out to the apartment,” Schaller said.

Whalpol shook his head. “A terrible business. We never thought â¦ never dreamed it could come to something like this. We're all shocked.”

Whalpol was not military. He was a bureaucrat. It showed in his bearing, so obviously that Roemer made the only other connection possible.

“I wasn't aware that the BND had an interest in this case,” he said. “It certainly would be much easier for you to liaise directly with Lieutenant Manning rather than have me in the middle.”

Whalpol grinned. “I told you that this one was sharp as a tack, Ernst. I knew it the moment you suggested him. With this one we cannot pull the wool.”

“Don't patronize me, Herr Major,” Roemer said
sharply. “It is late, I am tired, and there is a young woman lying dead and raped in Bad Godesberg. What exactly is my part in this investigation?”

Whalpol shot back, “You are to find Sarah's murderer. As simple as that.”

“Sharazad Razmarah.”

“We called her Sarah. It's the name she preferred.”

“What about Manning and the Bonn Kriminalpolizei?”

“They will satisfy the news media,” Whalpol said.

“I am to be given privileged information. I'm to find her murderer and turn himâor herâover to you. No trial. No justice?”

“That is correct, Investigator.”

“Why?”

Whalpol nodded. “I like you. You are a direct man. It means that I can speak directly with you.”

Roemer said nothing. He was angry. He didn't know the facts, and yet he was ready to judge.