nineteen-thirties when it became part of Hamburg under the Greater Hamburg Act. All of this was Danish soil for more than two hundred years. And Hamburg itself was jammed right up against the Danish border for most of its history.’
‘God, don’t get him started,’ Susanne said to Vestergaard. ‘Everything turns into a bloody history lesson. I know what you mean, Karin. I’m from the south. Bavaria. When I first came to Hamburg I felt it was very Scandinavian. Although they’re always banging on here about how English they all are. By the way, do you know what Jan’s nickname is?’
‘Oh, not that old chestnut,’ said Fabel. ‘Some people call me der Englishe Kommissar, because I’m half- British. Scottish, actually.’
Susanne laughed. ‘No, not that. I bet you don’t even know this one: Lord Gentleman.’
‘Who calls me that?’ Fabel looked accusingly at Susanne.
‘See?’ she said to Vestergaard. ‘Now he’s all offended. Do you know he buys all his stuff in the English shops in Hamburg? I used to think Harris Tweed was a romantic novelist until I met this one.’
Vestergaard laughed. ‘Actually, it’s funny,’ she said to Fabel, ‘when I first met you I thought you looked like a Dane. But so do a lot of people here.’
‘Aha.’ Fabel pointed his fork in her direction. ‘You’ve got it all wrong. I get my blond hair from the Scottish side of the family.’
‘I thought they were all red-haired with big bushy beards and drunk half the time.’
‘That’s only the women,’ said Fabel.
‘I’ll tell your mother you said that…’ Susanne smiled.
‘How did you two get together?’ asked Vestergaard. ‘If you don’t mind me asking. Was it through work?’
‘We worked together on a case about four years ago. He pursued me more relentlessly than he did the killer.’
‘As I remember, you didn’t try very hard to escape.’ Fabel grinned and took a sip of his wine.
‘Doesn’t work get in the way? I mean, having a personal and a professional relationship?’ asked Vestergaard.
‘We try not to let it,’ said Fabel. ‘We used to have this rule that we didn’t talk shop outside work. We still pretty much keep to that. But, of course, there are times when you can’t help it. The other thing is that Susanne is only involved in a small percentage of the cases I investigate. Ones like this killer we’ve got on the loose in St Pauli.’
‘I think that’s what went wrong with Jens and me.’ Vestergaard stared blankly at the table as she spoke.
‘You and Jespersen?’ Fabel put his wine glass down. ‘You were involved? Oh God, I’m sorry. I had no idea.’
She smiled weakly. ‘We split up about four years ago. Like I said, Jens found it difficult to accept that my career had overtaken his. Everyone knows that Denmark is a very liberal country. Along with Sweden and Finland we score the highest in the world for gender equality. But statistics don’t take the Danish character into account. Jens was a Jutlander and a very old-fashioned Dane. Sometimes I think it just stung too much that I was a woman promoted over him.’
‘Didn’t that make working together awkward?’ asked Susanne. ‘I mean after the split?’
‘We were in separate divisions for a while. It was only last year that we started working together again. And yes, it was difficult. But that had more to do with the way Jens went about his job and his general attitude to authority.’
‘Jespersen seems to have been a little like Maria Klee,’ Fabel explained to Susanne.
‘Maria Klee?’ Vestergaard raised her eyebrows.
‘The officer I told you about,’ said Fabel. ‘The one who had a complete breakdown after going off on a personal crusade.’
There was a silence for a moment, only broken when the waiter arrived with their orders.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Vestergaard. ‘I’ve killed the mood somewhat.’ She raised her glass and forced a smile. ‘No more shop talk. Agreed?’
‘Agreed,’ said Susanne.
The conversation slowly found its way back to shallower waters and the inconsequentialities that people who don’t know each other that well tend to discuss. But, as they chatted, Fabel watched Karin Vestergaard. He thought back to the anger she had shown when she saw Jespersen’s body at the mortuary. Anger directed at her dead colleague. Her dead ex-lover. He was beginning to understand the Danish detective a little better. So why did it give him a bad feeling?
9
There were things Fabel enjoyed about his job. And there were things he hated.
Leading a Murder Commission was a management task, bureaucratic and demanding a certain meticulousness: Fabel was not a natural bureaucrat nor naturally meticulous, or at least not when it came to paperwork. He had started the day off by getting Werner into his office. Werner’s heavy build and tough-looking appearance seemed at odds with what Fabel often thought of as a watchmaker’s mind within. Over the years, Fabel had learned to rely on Werner’s attention to detail and whenever he was thinking about allocating tasks to the team he called on his deputy’s counsel. Fabel had asked for, and got, extra resources to investigate the St Pauli killings while running an inquiry into Jespersen’s death. Technically, Fabel was supposed to manage the inquiries in parallel: assigning a team to run each while he directed them remotely. Oversight or overview or whatever the hell they liked to call it. Fabel didn’t like working that way. He believed a senior investigating officer should do just that: investigate. But the Polizei Hamburg, as Sylvie Achtenhagen was wont to point out any time someone aimed a TV camera at her, had screwed up the original Angel investigation. It was his job to make sure that there was a cross on every ‘t’; a dot above every ‘i’.
‘Put me and Anna on the St Pauli case,’ said Werner, taking clumsy care not to use the word ‘Angel’ and spark his boss off. Fabel was famous for despising the cartoon-character tags that the media liked to attach to multiple killers. ‘And team up Dirk Hechtner and Henk Hermann on this Danish thing. At least we’ve got enough other bodies drafted in. For once we seem covered.’
‘It’s amazing what the wrong kind of publicity can do for you,’ added Fabel grimly.
‘Cynicism doesn’t suit you, Chef,’ said Werner. ‘We’ve all come to love you for your shining wit and cheery disposition.’
‘Speaking of your overwhelming respect for me, do I have a nickname around here?’ asked Fabel.
Werner shrugged.
‘Do you know,’ said Fabel, ‘that some people have apparently been calling me “Lord Gentleman”? Making a big joke about me being half-British?’
‘Probably more to do with your wardrobe,’ said Werner, who moved on quickly. ‘News to me.’
By the time Werner had left they had worked out a comprehensive investigative plan for both inquiries. The St Pauli inquiry was already well under way, but the Jespersen case was still amorphous: ideas and conjecture rather than any kind of evidence. Another blank page in Fabel’s sketchbook.
On the St Pauli killings, Fabel had decided he would look into Jake Westland. The file told Fabel that Westland was British, born 1953, presumably illegitimately because he had been put up for adoption immediately after his birth, and had been brought up by middle-class adoptive parents in Hampshire. Studied music in London; first band formed 1972, second ’78, went solo 1981. Two gold discs, one platinum. Married three times. Four children by two of those marriages.
Fabel knew he needed to get beyond the naked facts. But the last thing he needed right now was to have to make a trip to England to talk to Westland’s family and friends. Hopefully, if she was not too distressed, he would get a chance to talk to the pop singer’s wife in a few days when she came over to claim the body.
In addition to the formally acquired information in the file, Fabel did an Internet search for Westland on his office computer. Putting together the pieces, Fabel started to build a picture of a man he did not like. Westland was,
