JF02 - Brother Grimm Read Free Page B

kind of evil. I know that it’s highly unlikely that I’ll ever encounter someone – some
thing
– like him again.’
    ‘What about the fact that he’s still out there on the loose?’ said Fabel, and immediately regretted it. It was a thought that had cost him the sleep of more than one night.
    ‘He’s far away from Hamburg by now,’ said Maria. ‘Probably far out of Germany or even Europe. But if he isn’t, and if we were to pick up his trail again, I’d be ready.’
    Fabel knew she meant what she had said. He didn’t know if he was ready to face the Blood Eagle killer again. Now or ever. He kept that thought to himself.
    ‘There’s no shame in easing back into things, Maria.’
    She smiled a smile that Fabel had not seen before: the first signal that something had, indeed, changed within Maria. ‘I’m fine, Jan. I promise you.’ It was the first time that she had used his first name in the office. The first time she had ever used it was as she lay somewhere between life and death in the long grass of a field in the Altes Land.
    Fabel smiled. ‘It’s good to have you back, Maria.’
    Maria was about to say something when Anna Wolff knocked on the door and entered without waiting to be invited.
    ‘Sorry to bust in,’ said Anna, ‘but I’ve just had forensics on the phone. There’s something we need to look at right away.’
    Holger Brauner didn’t look like a scientist, or even vaguely academic. He was a man of just medium height with sand-blond hair and a rugged, outdoor appearance. Fabel knew that Holger had been some kind of athlete in his youth and had retained a powerful, stocky frame. Fabel had worked with the head of the SpuSi scenes-of-crime unit for a decade and their mutual professional respect had developed into genuine friendship. Brauner was employed by LKA3, the division of the Hamburg Landeskriminalamt responsible for all forms of forensic investigation. He spent much of his time working out of the Institut für Rechtsmedizin, but also had an office by the forensics labs in the Präsidium. When Fabel entered Brauner’s office, Brauner was bent over his desk, examining something through a combined light and magnifying glass that was swung over on an articulated arm. When Brauner looked up he did not greet Fabel with his customary broad grin. Instead he beckoned for Fabel to come over.
    ‘Our killer is communicating with us,’ he said grimly and handed Fabel a pair of surgical gloves. Brauner stepped back to allow Fabel to examine the object on the desk. Set on a small sheet of plastic was a rectangular slip of yellow paper; it was about ten centimetres wide by five long. Brauner had laida clear perspex sheet over the note to protect it from contamination. The handwriting, in red ink, was tight, regular, neat and very small.
    ‘We found this in the girl’s fist. I am guessing that it was placed in her hand and the fingers closed around it post-mortem but before rigor set in.’
    Although the writing was tiny it was legible to the naked eye. But Fabel examined the note through Brauner’s illuminating magnifier. Through the lens the writing became more than words on paper: each tiny red stroke became a sweeping band across a textured yellow landscape. He pushed the magnifier to one side and read the message.
    Now I am found. My name is Paula Ehlers. I live at Buschberger Weg, Harksheide, Norderstedt. I have been underground and now it is time for me to return home
.
    Fabel straightened up. ‘When did you find this?’
    ‘We took the body over to Butenfeld this morning for Herr Doktor Möller to carry out the autopsy.’ Butenfeld was the name of the road in Eppendorf on which the Institut was located and had become police shorthand for the morgue there. ‘We were doing our usual pre-autopsy examination of the body when we found this squeezed into her hand. As you know, we place separate bags around the hands and feet to ensure that no forensic evidence is lost in transit, but this