‘I’m sorry,’ said Fabel.
‘Must you take my computer?’ asked Reisch. ‘I think you can understand that it means more to me than to most people. I spend hours on it each day. It’s my only window on the world and I won’t have it for much longer.’
‘How do you operate it?’ asked Fabel. ‘I mean, given your condition?’
‘I still have some movement in my hands, but not much. My computer is set up for voice recognition. I can control it by giving it spoken commands. Eventually, when I lose my ability to speak articulately, I will lose that too.’
Fabel looked down at the printout. Reisch’s alter ego. Fantasy self.
‘You’re wondering why…’ said Reisch. ‘Why do I pretend to be young and healthy? It’s simple: when I am on these sites, on the web, that’s who I become. I picked that photograph because he looks a little like I did at that age. He has the insolent look to him that I had. Once.’
‘I understand.’
‘No, you don’t. I’m not criticising you, but you can’t even begin to understand. Not until you’ve spent a minute in this body.’
‘You had contact with two of the four women who have been murdered. You even suggested meeting one of them. Why would you do that? How could you do that?’
Reisch made an odd rattling sound that took Fabel aback. Then he realised it was the disabled man’s attempt at a laugh. ‘I did meet with these women. I met with dozens of women. Sometimes partied all night. But not here. Not in the real world. When you read messages where we were arranging to meet, all of the venues are inside Virtual Dimension. It was all part of the fantasy. Of course I know that I could never go out into the physical world and meet the women I talked to on the internet, but for as long as I was there, in that world, I believed anything was possible.’
‘But you never asked any of them to come here? To visit you at home?’
‘Never. Now you’re proving that you don’t understand. I exist in two universes. Distinct and separate. I would never bring them together.’ Reisch paused again. A pause of short, shallow breaths. Listening to it gave Fabel a feeling of tightness in his chest.
‘Do you know,’ continued Reisch, ‘that in the near future people like me will probably be plugged into a virtual world for as long as they wish? An alternate reality where they will be able to live a normal life.’
‘But it wouldn’t be real life,’ said Fabel. ‘I think I’d rather be disabled in the real world than live out some kind of fantasy surrounded by people who don’t exist.’
‘But that’s the thing,’ said Reisch. ‘It wouldn’t be like that. It would be populated by others like myself: all escaping whatever was wrong with them and interacting with each other. Real people in an unreal world. But, of course, that will be too late for me. But that’s why I was signed into Virtual Dimension. It was as close as I could get to that type of alternate reality.’
‘Does anyone else have access to your computer?’ asked Fabel.
‘No one.’
‘What about Frau Rossing?’
‘Never. It is password-protected. And I don’t think Frau Rossing would know how to work one anyway. She’s very old school.’
‘I see,’ said Fabel, and for a moment he did not know what to say next; what to do next. ‘I’m sorry we disturbed you, Herr Reisch. I don’t think it’s necessary to take your computer away. But one of our technical experts may have to come out and have a look at it. There may be messages from these victims that have some relevance to our investigation.’
‘I understand,’ said Reisch, his voice still coming between breaths; still devoid of intonation. ‘I will cooperate in any way. I just want to keep my computer.’
It was going to be a late night. Fabel tried to get Susanne first at her hotel and then on her cellphone but was put through to her answering service. He left a message, telling her she might have to take a taxi from the airport the following day. He frowned, pausing for a moment, then said, without really knowing why: ‘That text message didn’t come from work. Anyway, I think I’ve accidentally deleted it. I’m going to have to hand this phone in to have it checked. I’ll phone you later to give you the number of the replacement.’
Glasmacher and Hechtner were back from the crime scene in Poppenbuttel and Fabel asked them to start writing up the report. He called Muller-Voigt at his home, but the politician was clearly out and again Fabel found himself talking to a machine.
‘Hello, Herr Senator. I’m afraid I haven’t had a lot of time to look into that matter we discussed last night. But she’s definitely not at the address you gave, just like you said. I’ve made some other enquiries and I’ll get back to you as soon as I have anything worth reporting.’
After he hung up, Fabel called Kroeger in the Cybercrime Unit and explained about the missing text on his cellphone; Kroeger said that his people would check it out if he sent it straight down. Fabel went to the canteen, first picking up a replacement cellphone from the technical division. He decided to sit and drink his coffee in the canteen: he was going to be at his desk for half the night and the idea of a few minutes outside his office appealed to him. He had not had any food since lunchtime but decided against taking the time now to eat; he’d grab something on the way home.
‘Do you mind if I join you?’
Fabel looked up and was surprised to see Menke, the BfV officer standing there, holding a styrene cup of coffee and holding Fabel in a steady pale blue gaze from behind the rimless spectacles.
‘No… no, not at all.’ Fabel frowned. ‘It’s late for you to still be here, Herr Menke.’
‘Yes.’ The agent sat down opposite Fabel. ‘I’ve been in meetings all day with the chiefs of the MEK units.’ Menke referred to the special-weapons and rapid-response wing of the Polizei Hamburg. ‘You know, planning for GlobalConcern Hamburg.’
‘I don’t envy you,’ said Fabel. ‘I think there are more than a few nutters out there who are going to try to make the summit a spectacle to get themselves noticed.’
‘You’re right there,’ said Menke emphatically. ‘Lots of world press there to see it all. There will be mass protests and there will probably be further acts of violence such as the arson attack the other day. That was the thrust of my meetings with the MEK chiefs: to establish a strategy of containment.’
‘Kettling?’ said Fabel with genuine surprise. ‘It wasn’t legal in eighty-six and it’s not legal now. I don’t see Herr Steinbach giving his approval to that.’ He referred to Hugo Steinbach, Hamburg’s Police President.
Menke was silent for a moment, holding Fabel in his insipid blue gaze while he took a sip of his coffee. Expressionless. Fabel thought back to the man in the wheelchair whom he had interviewed earlier in the day. He idly wondered if Menke had the emotional version of Reisch’s ailment.
‘Of course I’m not talking about kettling,’ said Menke eventually. ‘We live in a highly sophisticated time, Herr Fabel. Technologically. That means we have certain advantages that we didn’t have before. Our approach is more precision surgery than blunt-force trauma. When I say our strategy is containment, I mean we intend to isolate and excise those extremists who would hide themselves among genuine protesters. Our intelligence is good and getting better all the time. We don’t intend to contain the fire, we intend to prevent its ignition.’
‘I see,’ said Fabel, swirling the dregs of his coffee and examining them. ‘In other words, you’ve got people on the inside. Infiltrators.’