Hunter's Rain Page 4

  “We met…umm…in the street. You were on your way to us.”

  “Berger’s seen me. That young guy in the elevator, and the guy on the front desk...”

  “The duty sergeant and Berger won’t talk. Berger would rather have her teeth pulled without anaesthetic.”

  “Urrgh! Solidarity with me, despite everything?”

  “Solidarity with Jens,” Pappenheim corrected, “and with me. No offence.”

  “None taken.”

  “As for Hammersfeldt, Kaltendorf won’t lower himself to ask a mere sergeant in the assault team, even if he imagined Hammersfeldt might have seen me. Now for that background information I promised you.”

  Berger put her phone away as she hurried along the corridor, and turned the corner into another that would lead to the sergeants’ office.

  She found an impatient Kaltendorf waiting.

  “Well, Obermeisterin Berger?” he demanded. “Is he back in that cesspit he calls an office?”

  “Not yet, sir.”

  “Not yet, sir! Not yet, sir! That’s all I ever get. Müller out on some errand of his choosing; Pappenheim smoking himself to death God knows where…” Kaltendorf stopped abruptly, as if suddenly realising he was moaning to a roomful of sergeants.

  He glared at Berger. “I want them both, in my office!”

  “Yes, sir.”

  With a final glare, Kaltendorf stomped out.

  She waited until the marching slam of the pounding footsteps had faded, before letting out a weary sigh.

  “Just what I really wanted on a day like this.”

  Klemp, in his thirties, a senior sergeant with a weightlifter’s physique and a dangerously receding hairline, drew out a tabloid he had been reading before Kaltendorf’s sudden arrival. The paper was noted more for its girlie shots, than news content.

  “Feeling the withdrawal were you, Klemp?” Berger said as she moved to her desk.

  Klemp grinned at her. “Can’t get through to me, Berger.”

  “I know. I would need a rock drill.”

  Klemp grinned again, said nothing in response, and began to give serious attention to his paper.

  She glanced at her partner, Reimer, who sat at his desk with a glum expression. “Reimer, you look worse than the day outside. What is it this time?”

  Klemp looked up. “One guess.”

  “I asked Reimer, Klemp. Go back to your plastic surgeon’s fantasies.”

  Klemp ducked back behind his paper.

  “Come on, Reimer,” Berger urged. “What is it?”

  “It’s the usual,” Klemp said, without looking up.

  “Shut up, Klemp. I asked Reimer.”

  “I’m the senior sergeant,” Klemp began in protest, again looking up. “You can’t talk to me like that.”

  Berger said nothing, and gave the paper a pointed stare. Klemp went back to his bikini gazing.

  “So, Johann?” she went on to Reimer. “What’s eating at you?”

  “Whatever it is,” Klemp said from behind his paper, “don’t make it sick.”

  “Shut up, Klemp!” Berger and Reimer said together.

  Klemp smirked.

  “It’s Nina…” Reimer began eventually.

  “I knew it!” Klemp could not avoid saying. “It really hurts to see a good cop like you turn to jelly like this, Johann. Dump her, for God’s sake, and give us some peace!” He snapped his paper open, as if to emphasise the point.

  Both Reimer and Berger ignored him.

  “She’s on this diet thing,” Reimer went on, accompanied by a smirking noise from Klemp.

  Berger glared in his direction, but Klemp studiously kept his attention on whatever he was looking at.

  “Makes you blind,” Berger said to Klemp who made another smirking noise, but did not otherwise respond. “Go on, Johann.”

  “I think she’s influenced by her mother, who’s got hold of some stupid diet plan and has convinced Nina it’s a good thing. I mean, Nina was…was like you, you know…”

  “Watch what you say, Reimer,” Berger warned.

  “Um, what I mean is, she was…” Reimer looked at Berger closely. “…well, you know…womanly…” He started to draw a shape in the air with his hands, then thought the better of it.

  Klemp could not resist a peek. “Careful, Berger,” he said. “You two are partners. You don’t want Reimer having the wrong thoughts when you’re out there on a job, do you?”

  “I know where your thoughts are, Klemp,” Berger said coldly. “Go on, Johann.”

  “Well…she’s got…you know…thin. I’m really worried. If she fell against a cupboard, she’d sound like a snare drum solo…”

  Klemp guffawed. “Go rattle those bones!”

  Reimer gave him a hard look. “It’s not a joke, Klemp. She’s really ill…but doesn’t seem to know it. I’ve tried talking to her…”

  “She needs a doctor,” Klemp said.

  “For once,” Berger said to Reimer, “much as I hate to admit it, Klemp could be right.”

  “I’ll take the bows later,” Klemp said from behind his paper.

  Berger was dismissive. “You wish. Johann,” she went on to Reimer, “if your Nina has gone that far, she’s in trouble…”

  “And you’re in trouble,” Klemp put in to Reimer. “If she looks like one of those walking broomsticks, where’s the fun in…”

  “Shut up, Klemp!” Reimer and Berger snarled at him.

  “Why?” a mild voice enquired from the door. “What has he said?”

  Berger and Reimer’s heads snapped round. Klemp hurriedly tried to put his paper away.

  “Chief!” Berger said with a bright smile.“Didn’t hear you…”

  “I can be as quiet as a mouse when need be,” Pappenheim said to her, but he was looking at Klemp. “Make you blind, Klemp, reading that stuff.”

  “Er…” Klemp began, stuffing the tabloid into a desk drawer. He cleared his throat, and fell silent.

  All three sergeants looked neutrally at Carey Bloomfield, who was standing just behind Pappenheim.

  Pappenheim made no introductions.

  “Is he in his office?” he asked Berger.

  Berger knew he was talking about Müller. “Not yet, Chief,” she answered.

  “And the Herr Direktor?”

  “He wants to see you both in his office.”

  “I see,” Pappenheim said. It could have meant anything. “We’ll be in the Hauptkommissar’s office.”

  “Yes, Chief.”

  Pappenheim’s baby blue eyes raked Klemp. “Don’t let me spoil

  your reading, Hauptmeister Klemp.”

  Klemp swallowed, and said nothing.

  As Pappenheim moved on with Carey Bloomfield, Reimer whispered to Berger, “What’s the CIA princess doing here?”

  He was startled to see Carey Bloomfield back at the door. “I’m not CIA,” she said to him in perfect German. “I have a hard time explaining that.”

  She smiled at him, then went off after Pappenheim.

  “Shit,” Reimer said, after she had gone. “How could she have heard?”

  “It’s the stuff they feed them over there,” Berger remarked.

  “Ouch,” Klemp said.

  “Don’t mind Reimer,” Pappenheim said as they approached Müller’s office.

  “I won’t,” Carey Bloomfield assured him. “They’re jealous of their territory. I can understand that.”

  They paused at the door. Pappenheim knocked. There was no reply.

  “Looks as if we’ll have to wait,” he said, opening the door. “Umm, look…” he went on, then paused.

  “It’s okay, Pappi,” she told him, knowing exactly what was coming next. “Go have your smoke. I can wait here.”

  His relief was unashamed. “You don’t mind?”

  “Nope.”

  “I won’t be long.”

  “No hurry. Take your time.”

  A tiny, sheepish smile touched his features as he opened the door wider to allow her
to enter. “Thanks. Er…don’t touch anything.”

  “I won’t.”

  He pulled the door to, but did not shut it. He hurried back to his office, at something perilously close to a run.

  “Pappi, Pappi,” Carey Bloomfield said to herself with an amused expression as she walked further into the large, sparkingly-clean office.

  Furniture – clearly chosen by Müller and not standard issue - was kept to a bare minimum, storage units and the narrow wardrobe almost vanishing into the walls. The impression was of vast space.

  She looked about her. “If dirt got in here, it would die of fright.” She went up to the huge desk that dominated the room, and wiped an exploratory finger upon it. “This isn’t really touching. As I thought,” she continued, inspecting the finger. “Dirt’s been frightened away.”

  There was not even a trace to mark the passing of her finger, on the gleaming surface.

  “If I licked it, I’d poison it.”

  She studied the familiar model of the Hammond B3, seemingly in pride of place on the desk. The only other items there were two telephones: one red, one black.

  “You’re playing for me tonight, Mister,” she said. “You promised.”

  The desk faced a wide window that gave an almost panoramic view of the city. On the wall next to the window, was a painting.

  Continuing to prowl, she went over to the painting that was now hung in place of others she had seen there before.

  “So what’s the choice this time, Müller? We’ve had Mondrian, Monet, Matisse… What’s the mood this time?”

  She stood, feet close together, hands in the back pockets of her jeans, behind slightly stuck out as she stretched briefly.

  “Venet,” she continued. “’Indeterminate lines II’. Not sure where you’re headed, Müller?”

  “Life is a series of indeterminate lines,” came his voice from the doorway.

  She jumped, whipped her hands out of the pockets and straightened self-consciously.

  “Jesus, Müller! Can’t you knock?”

  “Er…it’s my office.”

  “So it is.” She gave him a watchful little smile that said she was pleased to see him, but with a hint of uncertainty.

  Pappenheim blew a long stream of happy smoke at the ceiling, picked up a phone, and made a call.

  “Ah, Hermann,” he greeted, as the other person answered. “How are things in Thessaloniki?”

  Hermann Spyros, a kommissar, was head of the unit’s electronics section.

  “Pappi! Nice of you to ask. But I know you did not really call to ask about my eastern Mediterranean relatives back there in the land that created democracy. You want to kidnap my genius goth again.”

  “How well you know me, Hermann.”

  “It so happens we’re having a relatively quiet time, so she’s at your service. And even if we did have a busy time, I’m assuming she’d still have to be at your service.”

  “How well you know me,” Pappenheim repeated.

  Spyros gave a brief chuckle. “If electronics wizardry translated into fast promotion, she’d be my boss. That kid is unbelievable. “

  “I know it. I suppose I shouldn’t ask about the German half of the family in Hamburg?”

  “Ach,” Spyros said. “Don’t ask. The Goth’s picking up her phone. Here she is.”

  “Sir?” Pappenheim heard.

  “Ah, Miss Meyer…”

  “I’m glad you called.”

  “You are?”

  “I have an idea, and I wanted to come and see you about it.”

  “Well. Good thing I did call. Come on up. Meet me at the documents room.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good to see you,” Müller said as he came further into the room. He stopped, a few feet from her.

  “You too,” she said.

  They looked at each other warily, as if afraid to say more.

  “I saw Pappi on the way in,” Müller said. “He told me you’re a lieutenant-colonel now. Big promotion.”

  “You know how it is. Sometimes, they chuck these things around. What they giveth, they can taketh away.”

  “The way it is.”

  “Yes. So, Müller,” Carey Bloomfield went on. ”Are we going to dance around all day? Or are you going to say hi properly?”

  He seemed unsure of what she meant.

  “Damn it, Müller!” she continued in mild exasperation. “A brief hug is okay!”

  She was about to approach him, arms beginning to open, when the pounding heels of marching footsteps could be heard, distantly at first, then with increasing volume as the grew closer.

  “The patter of tiny feet,” Müller said. “My master’s footsteps, I think.”

  “Saved by the bell,” Carey Bloomfield commented drily, arms falling back to her sides.

  He gave her a look of mild amusement as the pounding reached a crescendo and halted. A knock which was more like a banging thump, interrupted what he’d been about to say. This was immediately followed by the door being flung open.

  “Müller...!” Kaltendorf began.

  The words died as if switched off. Kaltendorf stared at Carrey Bloomfield and went into the fastest transformation Müller had ever witnessed. Coldly outraged eyes were suddenly full of warmth. He beamed. He fawned. He floated into the room it seemed, on amazingly silent heels. He was almost on his knees with bonhomie.

  “Miss Bloomfield!” he exclaimed with open delight, in English. “How good to see you!” Hand outstretched, eager for the handshake.

  Carey Bloomfield allowed him to grab her hand to shake it warmly. “Director Kaltendorf.”

  “When did you get here?” Kaltendorf asked, continuing to beam.

  “Minutes ago. As I was in town, I thought I’d look up some old friends.”

  “Good of you to count us among your friends.”

  Müller listened to this with a neutral expression.

  “Are we co-operating on a case?” Kaltendorf went on, clearly hoping this to be so.

  “Not a case, Director Kaltendorf,” Carey Bloomfield began to explain. “This is not an official visit. I’ve got some time off, and I thought…”

  “Why not see your friends in Berlin. Excellent! I know you’ll be in good hands with Müller, here. Remember that very first meeting?”

  “I do,” she remarked sweetly, glancing at Müller who was determinedly hanging on to his neutral expression.

  “Well, then,” Kaltendorf said, as if he had just presented a gift. “I’ll leave you two to it. Just looking in,” he added to Müller.

  “On the way here, I spoke with Pappenheim, sir,” Müller began. “He said you wanted to see us in your office.”

  Kaltendorf was affability itself. “No hurry. You attend to Miss Bloomfield. Enjoy your stay, Miss Bloomfield.”

  “Thank you, Director. I will.”

  Kaltendorf gave a little nod, and went out. He closed the door quietly behind him.

  They waited until the sound of Kaltendorf’s footsteps had faded for a good few seconds, before speaking.

  “Did I just miss something?” Carey Bloomfield asked. “Or was he really coming in here to bawl you out?”

  “He was coming in here to bawl me out.”

  “Suddenly he’s sweetness and light because of me?”

  “It would seem like it.”

  “Saved your butt again, Müller.”

  He gave her a tiny smile. “It would seem like it.”

  “What about mine?”

  “Do you want a personal answer? Or a professional one?”

  “Oh ho! Müller being risque! Be careful, Müller. You’re straying off the narrow path. The professional one will do for now.”

  “If you mean that police impersonator, next time he won’t be dressed as one. And yes, I’ll do my best to save your butt.”

  “That’s a relief. Pappi has given me a background picture of what’s been happening,” she went on before he could make comment, “since I last saw you. All of that true?�
�

  “It’s true.”

  She studied him closely. “Can’t leave you alone for a minute. You’re always in trouble, Müller.”

  “My curse.”

  “Pappi said they’re trying to get to you by hitting people close to you. Am I close to you, Müller?”

  “I…”

  The direct phone to Pappenheim rang.

  “Saved by the bell again,” Carey Bloomfield said.

  “Behave,” Müller said as he went to the phone and picked it up. “Yes, Pappi.”

  “We’re in the Rogues Gallery…”

  “We?”

  “The Goth and I. You should come. Oh. And our guest. She’s in this now.”

  “On our way. The Great White just visited,” Müller added.

  “I can’t wait.”

  “He was sweetness itself.”

  “Are you on something?”

  “It’s the truth. He saw Miss Bloomfield, and turned into a puppy. And we’re not to go to the headmaster’s study just yet.”

  “Oh the small mercies. Looks like she’s good for you, after all.”

  “I can hear something in there, but I’ll ignore it.”

  Pappenheim chuckled. “You can run, but you can’t hide.”

  “Thank you for the witticism, Pappi.”

  “Ah, those big words,” Pappenheim said. “How I love them.”

  “Pappi’s in the Rogues Gallery with the Goth,” Müller said to Carey Bloomfield as he put the phone down. “Something there he thinks we should see.”

  “The Goth,” she said. “Hedi Meyer. Tall, ethereal. Fragile-looking…as if. Loves to dress in any colour, as long as it’s black; paints her fingernails in a way that would make the Surrealists weep for joy; can disarm tiny electronically-primed bombs attached to people…and has a fancy for you.”

  “All correct…except that last part.”

  “You wish,” she said.

  He gave her a tolerant smile. “Get your coat. After the gallery, we’re going out. The weather does not look as if it wants to stop its end-of-the-world show today.”

  “Too early for lunch, and I’ve had coffee and cake with Pappi. So where to?”

  “Hunting out another part of the mystery, to which the man who wanted to shoot you today, belongs.”